Susiya - masked men throw a heavy barrage of stones in the courtyard of the house
Following the violent events in Susiya, we went to visit them so as to hear and report again about some new settlers there who are severely abusing the Nawaja’ah families.
Azzam told us what had happened on Saturday, December 21st. According to him, he went out at 6:30 to feed the sheep in a pen, about 100 meters from his house. There was heavy fog and almost nothing could be seen, yet he had the feeling that something was happening.
Indeed, on his return, he heard his wife Wadha shouting to him and calling him to come quickly because settlers had demolished the house of his neighbour, Hussein, about 300 meters from his house. On the way there, he saw near the house of Nasser, whom we know, a group of about 10 masked men, throwing a heavy barrage of stones in the yard of the house.
In the meantime, about 35 more settlers arrived from the Susiya settlement and threw stones. One hit him in the leg. “We called the police,” he says. And they, understanding that he had phoned the police, began to flee towards the Mishkan HaRo’im farm where Amishav Peled, whom we have written about before, lives. The farm is located halfway between the Susiya settlement and the Nawaja’ah family’s home. The incident lasted 40 minutes and it was another 40 minutes before the police arrived. Of course there was nothing for them to see. Nasser was angry that they had arrived so late. The police told him that the security forces had been there the whole time. “Yes,” Nasser replied, “but they are protecting the settlers, and they stood by and did nothing.”
Nasser told them to bring a tracker and a special forces unit and to really show that they were investigating.” The police officers told him to go and file a complaint immediately with the Hebron police.
So that is what they did, Nasser, Azzam, and Hussein, the victim of the current attack. Then, as befits the kind hearted sages of Khelem, there was no police officer there who knew Arabic and could take the complaint from Hussein, who does not know Hebrew. The other two told the policeman that they would translate Hussein’s words: “”No,” he replied, “you are interested parties, I can’t trust the credibility of your complaint. Only Hussein must report.”
They did as the police ordered. They returned without filing a complaint because there is no Arabic speaker in the Hebron police. In the afternoon of that day, six people came back to harass them. After fifteen minutes, they left. That’s how it is every day.
This morning, Shem Tov Luski, who lives in the ancient Susiya complex, arrived with a group of young volunteers who cut down the fence posts the Palestinians had made around the Shabur family’s plot. They came with a plough as if this was their land. This is an everyday occurrence, you can see the destroyed flower beds, the torn sheep feed sacks, and the cows eating from the olive trees. This is the routine of life there, over and over again.
Location Description
South Hebron Hills
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South Hebron Hills
South Hebron Hills is a large area in the West Bank's southern part.
Yatta is a major city in this area: right in the border zone between the fertile region of Hebron and its surroundings and the desert of the Hebron Hills. Yatta has about 64,000 inhabitants.
The surrounding villages are called Masafer Yatta (Yatta's daughter villages). Their inhabitants subsist on livestock and agriculture. Agriculture is possible only in small plots, especially near streams. Most of the area consists of rocky terraces.Since the beginning of the 1980s, many settlements have been established on the agricultural land cultivated by the Palestinians in the South Hebron Hills region: Carmel, Maon, Susia, Masadot Yehuda, Othniel, and more. Since the settlements were established and Palestinians cultivation areas have been reduced; the residents of the South Hebron Hills have been suffering from harassment by the settlers. Attempts to evict and demolish houses have continued, along with withholding water and electricity. The military and police usually refrain from intervening in violent incidents between settlers and Palestinians do not enforce the law when it comes to the investigation of extensive violent Jewish settlers. The harassment in the South Hebron Hills includes attacking and attempting to burn residential tents, harassing dogs, harming herds, and preventing access to pastures.
There are several checkpoints in the South Hebron Hills, on Routes 317 and 60. In most of them, no military presence is apparent, but rather an array of pillboxes monitor the villages. Roadblocks are frequently set up according to the settlers and the army's needs. These are located at the Zif Junction, the Dura-al Fawwar crossing, and the Sheep Junction at the southern entrance to Hebron.
Updated April 2022
Daphna JungMar-16-2025Simia: Farhan and his wife
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Susiya
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Susiya The Palestinian area lies between the settlement of Susya and a military base. The residents began to settle in areas outside the villages in the 1830s and lived in caves, tents and sukkot. To this day they maintain a traditional lifestyle and their livelihood is based on agriculture and herding. Until the 1948 war, the farmers cultivated areas that extended to the Arad area. As a result of the war, a significant portion of their land left on the Israeli side was lost. After the 1967 war and the Israeli occupation, military camps were established in the area, fire zones and nature reserves were declared, and the land area was further reduced. The Jewish settlement in Susya began in 1979. Since then, there has been a stubborn struggle to remove the remains of Palestinian residents who refuse to leave their place of birth and move to nearby town Yatta. With the development of a tourist site in Khirbet Susya in the late 1980s (an ancient synagogue), dozens of families living in caves in its vicinity were deported. In the second half of the 1990s, a new form of settlement developed in the area - shepherds' farms of individual settlers. This phenomenon increased the tension between the settlers and the original, Palestinian residents, and led to repeated harassment of the residents of the farms towards the Palestinians. At the same time, demolition of buildings and crop destruction by security forces continued, as well as water and electricity prevention. In the Palestinian Susya, as in a large part of the villages of the southern Hebron Mountains, there is no running water, but the water pipe that supplies water to the Susya Jewish settlement passes through it. Palestinians have to buy expensive water that comes in tankers. Solar electricity is provided by a collector system, installed with donation funds. But the frequent demolitions in the villages do not spare water cisterns or the solar panels and power poles designed to transfer solar electricity between the villages. Updated April 2021, Anat T.
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